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A long time ago (as in, 15 years), in a place called Colorado, there was a company named ServiceMagic. Over the years, this company, now named HomeAdvisor, built software applications to support the business of connecting service professionals with homeowners.
They wrote a lot of software.
A single web application became two, then three, then a half dozen or so. All of these applications shared the same underlying set of code libraries to run the core business functions. No, that's not quite true. All these applications used the same, single library, that contained all the business logic necessary to run the company. Attempts have been made over the years to try and carve out pieces of this code base into separate modules, with varying degrees of success.
As we pick up the story two years ago, there was really only one way to describe the architecture of the software used to run the company known as HomeAdvisor...
Monolithic.
Software Monolith Architecture Problems
We may … [Read more...]

At HomeAdvisor, we typically experience surges in traffic after major weather events, as homeowners and businesses alike need additional help with snow removal, handyman repairs, etc. But until recently, we never had a good way to visualize this increase in activity on our platform. At the micro level we could monitor core server performance, but metrics like CPU and memory utilization don't provide any context as to what is happening. And while application metrics like API requests and database queries give us a little more insight, they typically require some level of aggregation or translation to really understand them. In other words, looking at server and application metrics typically show you the symptoms of the problem without providing any diagnosis.
In this post we'll discuss our home grown real time data visualization suite that is based on Kafka, MongoDB, Node.js, and D3.js. This platform helps us visualize key business metrics and data in real time from any web browser. … [Read more...]

On Friday February 5th, as the Denver Broncos were preparing for Super Bowl 50, the HomeAdvisor technology group was gearing up to cheer on our home town team. The first Friday of every month is already known as "Fun Friday" around here. It's a chance for everyone to grab a beer, eat some good food, and enjoy an early start to the weekend with co-workers. With our beloved Broncos in the big game, this Friday had a little extra meaning to it, and it did not disappoint. With beer from GoldSpot Brewing, chicken wings from Kickin Wings, hot dogs from Billy's, and cupcakes from GiGi's, the whole team had a great time playing ping pong, foosball, and corn hole while decked out in orange and blue. And if that wasn't enough, we also introduced the newest member of our game collection: a brand new pool table.
Does this sound like the kind of place you'd love to work? We're hiring! If you're a Java, Android, DB, QA, or UX guru we'd love to hear from you. … [Read more...]

Today we are happy to announce the release of Robusto: our open source Java API client framework. The goal of this library is to help build resilient API clients while being as flexible and configurable as possible. At HomeAdvisor we use it for building HTTP clients, but the framework is not bound to any particular client or protocol.
You can find the official source code and documentation on our GitHub page. Below we'll talk about the motivation behind building this framework and how it helps us build a more robust microservice architecture.
Why Robusto?
The name Robusto is both an homage to the Java programming language in which it is written, as well as a nod to the similarly named coffee bean that is particularly strong and resilient to pests and disease.
The Need for Robust Clients
As we'll talk about more in future posts, in the past year or so we've begun breaking up our monolithic architecture. Instead of a few applications that do everything, we're building a large … [Read more...]

Welcome to the HomeAdvisor technology blog. Before we dive into what you can expect to find here, perhaps a little background is in order. HomeAdvisor, formerly ServiceMagic, is a marketplace that connects homeowners with ­­home service professionals. We are headquartered in Golden, Colo. Our technology group, which is responsible building and maintaining multiple public-facing platforms, is comprised of around a hundred or so engineers specializing in various disciplines — including Java, Front End, U/X, QA, CM and more. We practice Agile/Scrum techniques and are always self-evaluating to identify what we do well and what we can improve on. We emphasize stability, functionality and innovation in all of our processes. And when the going gets tough, we play ping-pong and foosball to help us clear our minds.
So what can you expect from this technology blog? Like many software organizations, we are constantly faced with challenges both large and small when it comes to designing, … [Read more...]

About Us

Based in Golden, CO, HomeAdvisor’s technology group is comprised of nearly 100 Java ninjas, front end gladiators, QA warriors, U/X experts and other rock stars. We build the technology that helps make HomeAdvisor the best place for homeowners to connect with home service professionals.